There is one scene in the otherwise low-key "Sophie Scholl: The Final Days" that's so startling it overshadows everything else in the film about a 21-year-old who was executed by the Nazis in 1943. After her conviction is read, Sophie (a quietly effective Julia Jentsch) walks away from the officer's desk, through a black curtain, is plopped on a plain table like a sack of potatoes and pushed, head first, to a waiting guillotine on the other end that beheads her. No dramatic climbing a scaffold, no last words. The moment is so sudden, so no-frills, it's hard to take in. Read the full review
In 1943, as Hitler waged war across Europe, a group of German college students calling themselves the White Rose mounted an underground resistance movement in Munich. The group's only female member, Sophie Scholl, was captured distributing pamphlets and interrogated by the Gestapo. Unwavering in her convictions, Sophie's trial became a searing test of wills.
Director: Marc Rothemund
Starring: Julia Jentsch, Alexander Held, Andre Hennicke, Fabian Hinrichs, Gerald Alexander Held
Run time: 117 minutes
Release date: Feb. 24, 2006
Rating: Not rated; includes adult themes, intense situations.
Language: German with English subtitles.
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Meet the director
Director Marc Rothemund says the film's goal is the same as that of the "White Rose": To make people think.
On the web
Official movie site
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution: B
"Sophie Scholl's is a story well worth telling, and this movie is one well worth checking out."
Austin American-Statesman: 4 of 5 stars
"The film is both artful and jaggedly intense, exquisitely acted, as if it were adapted from a world-class stage play."
The Palm Beach Post: B+
"Julia Jentsch as Sophie... bristles with intelligence, we can all but see her mind at work, yet she remains dry-eyed and even-tempered throughout."
